D&D General Does WotCs “Happy Holidays” post confirm a Ravenloft book in 2026?

Whizbang Dustyboots said:

Blizzard puts out holiday cards -- actually created for employees to send to work contacts -- that feature whatever the art team wanted to show off. Since they leaked online for years, now they just show them off publicly. Sometimes they reflect what's being worked on or what's coming up, sometimes they're just what would work best for a Christmas card (lots of orcs in snowball fights, etc.).

This image might not have been originally intended as a marketing image. In which case, trying to read the tea leaves about what it mean is a probably waste of time.

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I’m not trying to read any tea leaves, I just think it’s weird of them to pretend the card isn’t full of Curse of Strahd references.

I would not be surprised if we got another deluxe treatment of Curse of Strahd for 2024, but I hope it's not the case.

Revisiting House on Griffon Hill would be a monument task, though I would welcome it being done; not only is that adventure more suited to the likes of Call of Cthulhu (for it's investigative aspects), but the adventure is severely borked and would need a serious re imagining - especially the ending.

aco175 said:

I think this looks like Gandalf as well. They might be trying for Elminster which is more likely, but a LotR expansion would be cool for Wizards to pull off.

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Unlikely, but it could be Meredoth from Ship of Horrors

aco175 said:

I think this looks like Gandalf as well. They might be trying for Elminster which is more likely, but a LotR expansion would be cool for Wizards to pull off.

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Doesn't look at all like Mordenkainen. My first guess was either the 1e/2e version of Elminster or, more likely, just a stereotypical wizard. But, upon closer inspection, it looks like he's carrying a crystal ball (Palantir), so maybe it is indeed supposed to be Gandalf?

Starmaster said:

Doesn't look at all like Mordenkainen. My first guess was either the 1e/2e version of Elminster or, more likely, just a stereotypical wizard. But, upon closer inspection, it looks like he's carrying a crystal ball (Palantir), so maybe it is indeed supposed to be Gandalf?

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Reminder that Mordenkainen, who appears in Curse of Strahd, was in a state where he had a grown out beard and hair in that adventure because he was mind blanking himself to avoid Strahd learning about Oreth after he lost a fight with him.

So this is likely Mordenkainen in his “Mad Mage of Mount Baratok” persona

GarrettKP said:

Reminder that Mordenkainen, who appears in Curse of Strahd, was in a state where he had a grown out beard and hair in that adventure because he was mind blanking himself to avoid Strahd learning about Oreth after he lost a fight with him.

So this is likely Mordenkainen in his “Mad Mage of Mount Baratok” persona

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That’s what I’m saying!

Fizban? The Dragonlance incarnation was "nerferd" after the events of the war of souls and this could be abducted to Ravenloft by the Dark Powers, but this could be a great risk because the deity can be more dangerous than Vecna, or at least this could help Vecna.

I don't remember Moderkainen with that hat but maybe the artist didn't know enoughly all the characters.

A sequel or spin-off of Curse of Strand? I have got an idea. Strand creates a clone of himself, an ordinary human but a rewritten memory, this is a noble heart. Really this clone is the reincarnation of Sergei. This conquers the heart of the reincarnation of Tatyana. These are together and happy for a time, even they breed a daughter. But this is a gothic horror story and the tragedy has to arrive. Some time later Strand kills the clone to absorb his memories with Tatyana.

Or there is a reboot of the grand Conjuntion, and then the fate of Barovia(material plane) could be affected. What could offer this material Barovia? Enough space for supernatural factions: vampire bloodlines, werebeast tribes, spellcaster brotherhoods, fey houses, ghost guilds.. even this could be attacked by tripods(war of the worlds).

Charlaquin said:

I’m not trying to read any tea leaves, I just think it’s weird of them to pretend the card isn’t full of Curse of Strahd references.

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It's a wink to the fans. The people who notice the references feel good about being knowledgeable in the Lore, and produce multi-page threads across the internet discussing them. To the people who don't notice the references, Curse of Strahd™ probably doesn't mean anything in the first place.
This is how you maximize Engagement™ with just a simple holiday card!

LuisCarlos17f said:

Fizban?

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Certainly Fizban is pretty much indistinguishable from Gandalf, but I'm more inclined to say it's a representation of a PC wizard. The party may even represent PCs in the artist's own game.

The Horror Subclasses UA would fit a Ravenloft release, but I don't really feel that the subclasses detailed fit Barovia. The Artificer Reanimator subclass definitely makes me think of Lamordia. It would be interesting if they made Ravenloft book containing 5 Domains of Dread since 5 regions were outlined in the Forgotten Realms book.